Solutions that don’t break the bank, reinvent the wheel or marginalize our teachers are within our grasp. We could have rigorous classes, safe and disciplined schools and treat teachers like valued colleagues rather than easily replaceable cogs, and we could do so tomorrow if we wanted. Disclaimer, this is an opinion and commentary site and should not be confused as a news site. Also know that quite often people may disagree with the opinions posted.

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Wednesday, October 7, 2015

The title may be bombastic but that is what the school
board effectively said when they voted to cut off community discussions, many
of which have not even started by January, about radically transforming schools
that for the most part serve mostly poor and minority communities and it’s
shameful.

During the October 6th school board member the
board in a backwards fashion voted to end community debate in January and vote
of the Superintendent’s proposals to radically change 17 schools. I say in a
backwards fashion because only two members of the board, Scott Shine of the
beach and Jason Fischer of Mandarin wanted to end community input.

Chairwoman Cheryl Grymes was absent and all the other
school board members voted to involve the community as much as possible and
delay deciding on the proposals for a few months. Unfortunately the school
board has an obscure rule which says a change in their rules, takes five votes,
and thus the vote to cut off the community prevailed 2-4.

Now let me switch gears a little and talk about the former
mandarin school board representative Tommy Hazouri. I have to say I didn’t
think much of his time as a school board member. He is one of those lifetime
politicians that everyone complains about but enough people vote for to assure
he always has a job and his time on the school board was no exception. His
tenure on the board was unremarkable to say the least but he did do one think
that I thought was admirable.

If the district was going to do something that
affected a school he would often defer to the school board member who
represented that school, point of view. Unfortunately Scott Shine and Jason
Fischer don’t subscribe to this courtesy.

Why did I feel the need to mention this and Hazzouri?
Because none of the proposed changes are taking place in either Shine’s of
Fischer’s districts. Read that again. That means none of their constituents
will be effected and those board members whose constituents are who asked for
more time to inform and involve them were told no, you can’t do it.

Shine who is a millionaire and Fischer who I would
describe as upper middle class are two white men who just said “we know what’s
best for the African American community and their schools.” This is a message
that the power structure has regularly told the African American community in
Jacksonville and it is a huge reason for why we find ourselves where we are and
in case you are wondering, I am a white guy who can’t jump.

Furthermore neither Shine nor Fischer have any
education experience. Shine like Hazouri looks at the school board as a line on
a resume, while Fischer who has already announced he is running for the Florida
House and did so almost a year ago, obviously sees the school board as little
more than a stepping stone and friends before he loved education he loved soil
and water because he ran for a seat there before running for the school board. It’s
hubris and their personal agendas which drive their decision making not what is
best for our schools and certainly not what the community thinks.

As bad as all that is, it gets even worse. I imagine as the vote was unfolding, Vitti was
sweating bullets you see not even he believes in all his suggestions and even
said as much in a September 8th Times Union story:

I’m not going into this
process believing everything in the recommendations needs to be done,” he said.
“But my responsibility as superintendent is to be proactive regarding the
short-term and long-term challenges... This is an opportunity for us to leverage
our buildings, to not give them to a charter school and not sell our properties
and land.”

He said, I’m not going into this process believing everything in the
recommendations needs to be done.
Then what the heck is he doing? Just spit balling ideas? Throwing paint
against the wall and hoping something sticks? Wouldn't it be nice to know which
ideas he thinks we desperately have to see come true and which ideas he was
just messing with us with? Since he isn’t even behind all of them, is it too
much to ask that the communities that will be effected get the chance to find
out if they can?

Almost unbelievably it
gets even worse. The district through the Quality Education for All initiative
has invested fifty million dollars over three years into thirty six schools on
the north and west sides of town. The district is calling these schools the
transformation schools.

They are using the
money to put in extra resources and financing a massive merit pay scheme
designed to attract the best and brightest to those schools. Now I think it’s
going to end up being a waste of money and its beginning to look like the
district thinks so too because most of the schools they want to fundamentally
change are part of the QEA schools. The QEA is barely a year old and the
district is already throwing its hands up and saying, you know what let’s try
something new.

So let me sum up, we
have two well off white school board members telling the north and west sides
of town that their opinions about the future of their schools don’t matter
supporting proposals at least some of which not even the superintendent who
made them believes in while initiating the district’s second massive turnaround
plan in a little over a year and a half a year and a year and a half before the first is
supposed to come to a close.

We have problems here in Duval County, I can’t sugar
coat them but the biggest one by far is a lack of effective leadership.

2 comments:

They will reconsider and vote to delay when Grimes is back. Now there's a story to pursue. Why was she absent given the importance of the issues in front of the school board? But I agree with you, Shine and Fischer have put the lie to any belief that they have the empathy to be effective board members. Vitti said we should take the time we need to get the FSA, scoring, and school accountability right. He is bucking the state on that. Why doesn't he, Shine, and Fischer believe that about these radical changes? (Radical meaning at the root, fundamental changes in these schools and what they offer.)

Hazouri was smart enough to know to watch Joey Wise about the finances and the flim-flam games the one-time superintendent played during his years in Delaware. Too bad Scott and Fischer are too busy building their resumes to do any useful service on the school board.